I think I established my total disconnection from ‘Reality TV’, which may be on TV but has almost nothing to do with reality.

Frankly, when I saw references to Duck Dynasty I assumed it was a on the Cartoon Network. Now it is the basis for another Fundie Christianist meltdown.

Badtux covered the kerfuffle as someone born and raised in Louisiana, and that has to be part of it, but the whole thing smells.

I saw pictures of the guy, and my response was – this is a put on. Looking like you were in the mountains with Fidel and Che is not the sort of fashion statement that normally attracts GQ, so the interview seems just wrong.

The most obvious mistake is the beard. I’ve had a full beard for decades and know about living with a beard. I hack it back at least once, and normally twice, a year so that it doesn’t get in the way.

That beard is too long to put up with in real life. You can’t move through the brush without it snagging on something. You have to know where it is when going to bathroom. You have to be very careful around fires. It will catch in zippers, doors, chairs, actually just about anything. If a tie is a problem around power tools, that beard is even worse.

This smells like jockeying for position over a contract renewal, or maybe a ratings event. My understanding is that the show was on hiatus, so he wasn’t really working when things blew up, but A&E is certainly not interested in this kind of controversy. If the ratings have been dropping in the key ‘young adult’ demographic, A&E may have already planned to drop it.

The real point that people should take away from all of this is that religion is a choice. People make a decision for themselves as to what they’ll believe and can change their minds at any time. Skin color and sexual orientation are there at birth, and can’t be changed. If people choose a religion that discriminates against anyone for the way they were born, those people have chosen to discriminate, and there is no way around it.

Yes, today is the celebration of the very untraditional Festivus.

If you celebrate I hope all of your grievances were aired and the airing did not involve the Festivus pole being used in an inappropriate fashion.